This invention relates to the art of electronic devices, and more particularly to a new and improved method of making a surface mountable electronic device.
Surface mountable electronic devices have become increasingly desired and requested. Briefly, such devices have electrodes rather than leads and are mounted directly on the circuit paths on a circuit card or board and thereby avoid the need for apertures in the board to receive leads of devices for making electrical connection.
Heretofore, surface mountable electronic devices typically have been made by what is known as the lead frame process wherein the device is soldered to a frame then encapsulated followed by cutting out portions of the frame which become the leads for the device. This process is laborious, requiring alignment of the device on the frame and mounting each device on the frame. In addition, the lead frame process requires that the devices be within certain size limitations. Furthermore, since the lead is separately attached to the device in the lead frame method, the possibility exists that the lead can become detached from the device during use.
It would, therefore, be highly desirable to provide a method of making a surface mountable electronic device which minimizes the number of times the device is handled during the process, imposes no size limitation on the device and avoids the potential problem of lead detachment during use.